Bdub's Film Reviews

[BWilli]

Well now I’m pissed.  I typed up my entire review for this film, and clicked post, and it asked me to log in (which I already was) and I lost the review.  

Oh well, life goes on…

All right:

As I’ve stated before in another thread (possible the thread for this film), I love football movies.  Up until last night “Rudy” was my favorite.  That may have changed after seeing “Friday Night Lights”.  Directed by Peter Berg, the film stars Billy Bob Thornton, Tim McGraw, Lucas Black, Derek Luke, Jay Hernandez, Garrett Hedlund and Lee Thompson Young.

Based on a true story, which took place in 1988, this film follows the season of an ultra-competitive Texas-based high school football team, as they shoulder the entire town's hopes, dreams and indirect threats to win the state championship.

Thornton stars as Gary Gaines, the head coach for the Permian Panthers, the local high school team in Odessa, TX.  Lucas Black is Mike Winchell, the quiet yet amazing quarterback for the team.  Derek Luke is Boobie Miles (  :razz: boobie) who is the real star of the team.  The town-folk believe he is the reason the team will go undefeated and win the state championship.

In the first game of the season, Boobie (  :razz: boobie) is kickin’ ass, scoring all of the 40+ points for the Panters.  Gaines takes him out in the fourth quarter, and puts in the second string running back.  This dude gets hurt, so he decides to put in the third stinger Chris Comer (Young), who can’t seem to find his helmet.  Boobie (  :razz: boobie) goes back in and gets injured.  They win the game, but the crowd’s excitement turns to concern for the star player.  The season is now in jeopardy.  

I’ll stop there as to not ruin any of the film.  You’ll definitely have to check it out.

On to the acting:

Thornton gave us a great performance and showed the stress that Gaines was under from the people of Odessa.  They wanted him to bring home the state championship and would except anything less than that.  You could tell that he just wanted to belt out a “Go fuck yourself.  If we win fucking win, we fucking win.  If we lose, to fucking bad.”  He yelled a lot, but when it came to cursing, all he got out was a “Gosh darn it” type of line.  It was actually kind of funny to see Thornton like this.  Mainly because the last film I saw him in was Bad Santa.  

McGraw’s character was probably my favorite in the film.  Sure, he played a drunken, washed-up, abusive, asshole father, but he did a great job at it.  I kind of felt his anger, disappointment, and impatience with his son.  All he wanted was for his son to be as good as he was.

I haven’t seen many of Lucas Black’s other films, but I’m gonna try to.  The kid is a really good actor and played his role perfectly.  Like Thornton, Black showed the stress that his character was under.  Once Boobie got injured, Winchell had to try and carry his team to the championship.  That, as well as his ill mother, was really tough on him, but he never gave up.

Derek Luke as the cocky Boobie (  8O cocky boobie), really showed his talent as an actor.  At first I didn’t like the character.  I’m not big on people who gloat about how good they are.  But Boobie knew he was the best football player in Odessa, and he wanted everyone else to know it too.  The way Luke portrayed Boobie Miles, showed you how strong-willed Miles must have been.  After the injury, he kept his head held high around the other players, not showing how crushed he was, but you could tell he was heart broken.  All he wanted to do was play football.  His greatest talent was taken away from him.  Luke turned out to be another of my favorite actors in this film.

The film is very character driven and, I don’t know about the rest of the audience, but I felt for each one of the lead actors throughout this film.

There was only one thing I didn’t like about the film, and it dealt with the creative side of the movie.  There was a lot of hand-held camera action, and it got a little distracting at first.  Once the film gets going though, it didn’t become too much a big deal.

Football fan or not, I think you’ll like this movie.

[BWilli]

It was chick flick weekend.  I went and saw "Shall We Dance?"

The films stars Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon, Jennifer Lopez, Stanley Tucci, Lisa Ann Walter and Nick Cannon.

John Clark (Gere) is a man with a wonderful job, a charming wife (Sarandon) and a loving family, who nevertheless feels that something is missing as he makes his way every day through the city. Each evening on his commute home, John sees a beautiful woman, Paulina (Lopez), staring with a lost expression through the window of a dance studio. Haunted by her gaze, John impulsively jumps off the train one night, and signs up for dance lessons, hoping to meet her. At first, it seems like a mistake. His teacher turns out not to be Paulina, but the older Miss Mitzi, and John proves just as clumsy as his equally clueless classmates on the dance-floor. Even worse, when he does meet Paulina, she icily tells John she hopes he has come to the studio to seriously study dance and not to look for a date. But, as his lessons continue, John falls in love with dancing. Keeping his new obsession fro his family and co-workers, John feverishly trains for Chicago's biggest dance competition. His friendship with Paulina blossoms, as his enthusiasm rekindles her own lost passion for dance. But the more time John spends away from home, the more his wife becomes suspicious. With his secret about to be revealed, John will have to do some fancy footwork to keep his dream going and realize what it is he really yearns for.

Romantic comedies are generally not my type of movies, but this was better than I had expected it to be.

The story was decent.  Nothing most of us haven't seen before.  

Stanley Tucci and Lisa Ann Walter made the film really funny.  Their characters were great.

Seeing Richard Gere prance around for two hours was pretty funny.

JLo showed off her ASSets in a sort of smaller role than what we've seen her in lately.

Sarandon as the suspicious wife was just okay.  She was kind of quirky in this one.

It deserves at least one

[BWilli]

After the chick-flick, I went home and watched the suspense thriller "Highwaymen" on DVD.

This one stars Jim Caviezel, Rhona Mitra, Frankie Faison, and Colm Feore.

Since the hit-and-run murder of his wife five years ago, Rennie Cray (Caviezel) has crisscrossed America in his souped-up, stripped-down '68 Plymouth Barracuda (awsome car), pursuing her killer. The man he seeks in a high-speed, high-stakes game of cat-and-mouse is James Fargo (Feore), a merciless, wheelchair-bound pyschopath. Through a series of mechanical innovations, Fargo has turned his rampaging '72 Cadillac Eldorado into a monstrous extension of his own twisted body and mind. Now, their deadly battle of wits and wills is about to move into overdrive. And caught in their headlights is a tormented beauty, Molly (Mitra), who unwittingly holds the key to their ultimate showdown.

This is definately my type of movie.  Fast pasted action thriller with cool cars, a hot woman, and great acting.  Excellent movie.  

I've been a fan of Caviezel since I saw him in "Frequency".  The guy is a great actor, and continued to prove that in this movie.

This was a step up for Mitra, who normally plays smaller roles.  As the lead actress in distress, she did well.

Colm Feore plays the perfect bad guy.  Kind of like John Malkovich and Gary Oldman.  He's got that evil look.  We don't really see much of him until the half-way point in the film, but I liked him as the psycho.  It worked perfect.

I recommend it.  Rent it, buy it, steal it..okay, don't steal it, but see it somehow.

[BWilli]

Went to see The Grudge on Friday.

It stars Sarah Michelle Gellar, Bill Pullman, Clean DuVall and Jason Behr and is directed by Takashi Shimizu (who also directed the original version).

Kare Davis (Gellar) is a woman residing in Japan with her boyfriend, who is studying abroad. Temporarily assigned to be caretaker for a woman with severe sleeping conditions, Kare goes to an unsuspecting house. But what she finds, is something she would never expect. The house is plagued by the presence of murderous ghosts, the result of a curse. The curse is born from someone dying in a powerful rage. Now, Kare finds herself being tormented by that curse, as it eventually starts claiming it's victims.

I went into this film hearing from others that, although scary, it really wasn't all that great of a film.

If you want to compare it to The Ring, Grudge was a hell of a lot more scary, but did not have as good a story as The Ring.

Actually, the stories were kind of similare as well.  Someone dies, the sprit hangs around and starts killing people.  

However, I thought this was a decent film overall.  It's definately the scariest movie of the year, and one of the scariest I've seen in a while.  I'd love to see the original to compare it with that.

I felt the acting could have been better.

Gellar was not stellar.  Okay, but nothing special.

Pullman had a small role, but was extremely key to the story.  

DuVall and Behr also had small roles.  They didn't stand out, but didn't have to either.  They were just in the film to make the body count higher?  Maybe  

Yuya Ozeki, who plays the little boy Toshio, was pretty friggen creepy.

I woud've enjoyed it better without the dozen or so 13 year old girls in the front row screaming every five minutes and running in and out of the theater, but it wasn't as bad as some people were claiming it to be.

I'll give this

[BWilli]

I went to see "Birth" last night.

The films stars Nicole Kidman, Cameron Bright, Lauren Bacall, Anne Heche, and a buncha other people I've never heard of.

Kidman stars as Anna, who ten years ago lost her husband.  Now ten years later, she's engaged to Joseph (Danny Huston), when a ten year old boy (Bright) shows up claiming to be Sean, Anna's dead husband.

Young Sean does a great job convincing Anna that he is indeed her husband, knowing a lot of things, how she met Sean, how they got married, where they've had sex, and so on...Anna becomes so convinced that she begins to fall in love with the kid....

Weird and sick no doubt.

The movie is about an hour and forty minutes long...and I liked it up until the last 20 minutes.

I was extremely disappointed and unsatisfied in the end.  And I wont spoil the ending for you, but I will warn you.  It was not such a great film.  I don't know what the hell is goin' on with Nicole Kidman, but she hasn't been picking some great projects as of late (although I heard Cold Mountain was good, and I do want to see it)

Although I enjoyed the film for the most part, the ending kind of ruined that enjoyment for me, so overall, I was not happy with the story whatsoever.  

Some of the cinematography was good.  There was one close up of Kidman that seemed to last for an hour, but was really only about 3 to 4 mins.  That's a lot of time to focus on one person, but you see in her eyes her feelings toward the stuff that is going on.  I thought that was pretty good shooting.

BUT...the best cinematography in the world could not help the story.  There's just so much I would change about how the film ended.

If you want to see this film, you can, but I would give you the advice of saving the $9.50 and either rent it, or wait for HBO.

 

[BWilli]

I didn’t get out to the theater this weekend, but I watched two of my many DVDs.

First up, a film that I had only seen parts of on television, which sucks because they cut out all of the good stuff, “Dogma”.

Directed by the brilliant Kevin Smith, and starring Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Linda Fiorentino, Salma Hayek, Chris Rock, Jason Mewes, Kevin Smith, Jason Lee, and George Carlin, this film was even better than I had ever expected.  Of course I’ve only heard great things about the film since it came out in ‘99.

Bethany (Fiorentino), the last descendant of Christ is called upon by the Voice of God (Rickman) to stop two exiled angels, Loki (Damon) and Bartleby (Affleck) from entering a New Jersey church and thus negating all existence. She is aided by the little know thirteenth apostle named Rufus (Rock), a literal muse turned stripper (Hayek) and two bad-mouthed, mall-crawling, joint-smoking prophets: Jay (Mewes) and Silent Bob (Smith). An ex-muse turned demon named Azrael (Lee) tries to keep the group from accomplishing their goal so he can have his revenge against God.
This film has probably sneaked into my top ten favorite movies of all time (at least I’ll have to re-evaluate the current top ten).
The film is really original, putting all of these biblical names into a modern setting, with an extremely funny script.  I haven’t been a big fan of Smith’s, mainly because I haven’t seen many of his films, except for Jersey Girl.  But I’m definitely going to check out Chasing Amy and Mallrats.

The entire cast was amazing.  Jason Mewes was hilarious, but mainly because of his mad use of profanity in every scene he’s in.  Smith as the not-so Silent Bob (he had like two or three lines) was funny too.

Linda Fiorentino was great as Jesus Christ's great great great great great grandniece.  I’m not sure what other lead roles she’s had, but she was perfect in this role.

Chris Rock is always funny, so yeah, hilarious as the never-heard-of 13th apostle Rufus.

Affleck needs to do more films like this again.  Maybe his career wouldn’t be in the shitter if he did.

Damon was cool as Loki.  Damon has become a pretty cool star these days.

I liked Rickman as the Voice of God.  He generally a great actor, and continued that trend in this film.

Jason Lee was pretty good.  Nothing too stellar from him, however the holy bartender scene was really good.  Get it…holy bartender…haha…classic.   :lol:

Overall...an excellent hilarious religious film.  And for those of you who don’t think that hilarious and religious should be linked, just remember…God has a sense of humor too.  Just look at the Platypus.   :razz:

[BWilli]

The second DVD I watched was “Swimming Pool”.

The film stars Charlotte Rampling and Ludivine Sagnier.

Sarah Morton (Rampling) is a famous British mystery author. Tired of London and seeking inspiration for her new novel, she accepts an offer from her publisher, John, to stay at his home in Luberon, in the South of France. It is the off-season, and Sarah finds that the beautiful country locale and unhurried pace is just the tonic for her--until late one night, when John's indolent and insouciant French daughter Julie (Sagnier) unexpectedly arrives. Sarah's prim and steely English reserve is jarred by Julie's reckless, sexually charged lifestyle. Their interactions set off an increasingly unsettling series of events, as Sarah's creative process and a possible real-life murder begin to blend dangerously together.

This film is oddly confusing however intriguingly brilliant.  In fact, I’m still a little confused and wondering what the hell happened, but the film is a great character study.

Sarah and Julie are two totally different people, however they end up forming a really strange bond.  The two worked well together at the beginning when Sarah was really pissed off that she wouldn’t have the peace and quiet she had originally wanted, and they worked well together all the way up until the strange ending, when they weren’t feuding, so to speak.

The film starts off sorta slow, with various shot of Sarah going about her business, but once she gets to France, the pace picks up a tad, not much…but that’s when the real story begins.

The two actresses are just amazing.  I haven’t heard of either Rampling or Sagnier up until this movie, but they are damn good actresses. Rampling really gives you a true sense of a completely pent-up British woman, while Sagnier brought the ideal blend of youth, sexuality and extraversion to her role, not to mention many shots of her breastage (I love creating weird and stupid words).

I think that main thing I love about this film is that I’ve been thinking about it since it ended, because I’m still not really sure what happened.  It’s another one of those movies where if had ended just a few minutes earlier, I’d understand it with no problem.  But this one has left me wondering.  And I really kinda sorta like that.

Excellent movie.  I’d like to know what people think about it, if they’ve seen it, so I’m creating a thread (unless there already is one) for the film.

[BWilli]

It was another DVD weekend for me.  First, I watched The Amityville Horror.

The film stars James Brolin, Margot Kidder and Rod Steiger.

Brolin and Kidder star as newlyweds George and Kathy Lutz, who move into the empty home and are gradually affected by the legacy of a murder committed on the premises. Rod Steiger is a priest who can tell what's up.  When the other priests don’t believe him and basically think he’s crazy, they tell him to take a vacation, and leave things the way they are.

I’ve read a lot of things about how cheesy the effect are, but they are would they could be for the time.  You have to remember, the film was made in 1979.  They didn’t have the same type of technology we have now.

I thought that Brolin was great in this film; almost (and this is a big almost) similar to Nicholson in The Shining.  Slowly his character begins to go crazy.  Excellent performance.

Steiger, may he rest in peace, was always a great actor, so he was perfect in his role as the priest.

Kidder was decent.  Your basic scared shit-less wife.  Nothing stellar, but she’s a pretty good actress overall.

All in all I’ll give this movie

As an avid horror film fan, I felt the film could’ve been a lot scarier.  I can’t wait for the new version to be released next year so I can compare the two.

[BWilli]

Second DVD I watched, The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981 version)

The film stars Jack Nicholson, Jessica Lang, John Colicos, with brief appearances by Angelica Houston and Chritopher Lloyd.

Frank Chambers (Nicholson) drifts into a town where he meets Nick Papadakis, the owner of a small diner/gas station.  Nick decides to give Frank a job as a mechanic and gas station attendant.

Nicholson plays Frank Chambers, a drifter who happens upon a roadside diner run by Cora Papadakis (Jessica Lange) and her Greek husband, Nick (John Colicos). Sparks fly, and about 20mins into the film, Cora and Frank are engaging in one of the raunchiest sex scenes I’ve ever seen on film (non-XXX that is).  One thing leads to another and they conspire to murder Nick.  All goes well until one little slip up.

The film is great.  I’d love to see the original and compare the two.

Nicholson is at his best (wait…he always is) and Lange was just amazing (not too mention pretty damn hot back then).  

Excellent movie and excellent acting.  I loved it.

[BWilli]

Well...it's been a few weeks since I've had the chance to get to a theater, but this weekend I found the time.

I saw "The Incredibles".

The film stars (the voices of) Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter, Samuel L. Jackson, and Jason Lee.

Mr. Incredible (Nelson) is a superhero; or he used to be, until a surge of lawsuits against superheroes submitted by the people they've saved forced the government to hide them in witness protection programs so they could lead normal, anonymous lives. Now known exclusively by his secret identity, Bob Parr, he lives with his wife Helen (Hunter), formerly Elastigirl, and their three children Violet, Dash, and Jack Jack. He works as an insurance claims specialist, and he's fed up with his pushy boss and his immoral profession, but his wife's worked too hard to build a normal life for her family to abide his nostalgia for heroism. When Mr. Incredible's offered the chance to play the role of hero again by a mysterious informant, he jumps at the opportunity, but when it turns out to be a trap set by an old nemesis, Buddy Pine/Syndrome (Lee), he had a hand in corrupting, the whole family must reveal themselves to save Mr. Incredible and countless innocents.

Anyone else feel like Violet, the daughter, looked like the dead chick from The Grudge? Freaky shit right there.

Anyway...I liked the movie.  I had been hearing mixed reviews from a lot of people.  Some liked it, some didn't.  I found it very entertaining, as I have pretty much all of Pixar/Disney's computer animated films.

Craig T. Nelson as Mr. Incredible was pretty cool.  This guy hasn't done much in the past few years, so it was good to see (or hear) him work on a great movie.

Holly Hunter was great as well, voicing Elastigirl.  

I didn't laugh as much as I was expecting to, but once the character of Edna (voiced by director Brad Bird), the superhero costume designer, showed up, I couldn't stop laughing.  She was definitely the funniest character in the film.

Missing from the film, was Samuel L. Jackson, who voiced superhero Frozone, best friend of Mr. Incredible.  Sure he was in the movie, but not as much as he should have been.  Great character, just not enough screen time.

The film started rather slow, and ran for almost 2 hours (the theater said 2 hours 10 minutes, but we all know that they include the previews in that).  All in all excellent film...probably the second best Pixar/Disney film (behind Nemo).  If you haven't seen it, I think you should.  You'll more than likely enjoy it.

[BWilli]

Went to see National Treasure last night.

The film stars  Nicolas Cage, Diane Kruger,Justin Bartha, Sean Bean,
Jon Voight, and Harvey Keitel.

Since childhood, Benjamin Franklin Gates (Cage) has known that he is decended from a long line of people whose job is to guard a treasure hidden by the Founding Fathers, who hid clues to its whereabouts in the country's currency and on the back of the Declaration of Independence. Now, he has learned that one of his partners, Ian (Bean) is plotting to steal the Declaration, and has only one option: steal it himself. Even if he pulls off this monumental task, keeping the treasure safe is still going to be incredibly hard, especially since the FBI has also gotten wind of the scheme.

This film is a whole lot of fun, and I loved it.  I was entertained for the entire 2+ hour movie.  It's got plenty of action, comedy, and even a teeny bit of romance.

Cage was great, probably the best he's been in a few years.  I'm sure he wont be winning any awards (these types of films rarely ever do), but this is definatley his best role in a while.

Diane Kruger plays National Archivist Abigail Chase, who gets brought into this when Gates tries to inform her that someone is going to steal the Declaration.  Naturally, she doesn't believe him...until he actually does it.  Then she comes along for the rides.  Kruger is a pretty good actress (I've only seen her in one other film, "Troy"), and was good in this role.

Justin Bartha plays the annoying but pretty funny side-kick of Gates, Riley.  Nothing spectacular, but his character did deliver most of the funny lines.

Sean Bean always plays a great bad guy, and does so again here.  It may be getting to a point where he is type-cast as "the bad guy"..even though in LOTR he was kinna swinging both ways...sorta...anyway...Bean is a cool actor and perfect for the role of Ian.

Jon Voight plays Patrick Gates, B.F. Gates father.  Possibly my favorite character in the film, Voight was amazing.  The guy is a classic actor, and he was quite funny in this film.  

I didn't even know Harvey Keitel was in this film until he showed up on screen.  He plays FBI Agent Sadusky.  I can't remember the last major film I saw him in, so I was pleased that Keitel was in this.  He's another great actor and played a good supporting role here.

I loved the movie, and I recommend it for anyone who like the Indiana Jones-type films.  You'll definately be entertained.  The films has also been said to be similar to "The DaVinci Code" story, which I haven't read, but plan on.  

[BWilli]

I watched "21 Grams" starring Sean Penn, Naomi Watts and Benicio Del Toro.

The lives of three people are drawn together when loving housewife Cristina Peck (Watts) is forced to suffer the loss of her husband Michael and their two daughters, killed in a hit-and-run by born-again ex-con Jack Jordan (Del Toro). Paul Rivers (Penn), a college professor dying of heart failure, becomes the recipient of Michael's transplanted heart and is drawn to Cristina out of the debt of life owed to her husband. Their connection affects irreparable change in the lives of all three, and through their experiences they will find hope, despair, and redemption.

I was a little confused when the film began because it kept jumping back and forth between different periods of time, but things eventually became crystal clear.  This film was amazing and extremely powerful.  Penn, Watts and Del Toro were at their bests.

Penn was amazing as the man who just wanted to get to know the wife of the man who saved his life.  In turn he wanted to help her with her grief, and eventually falls in love with her.

Del Toro, if he had not been up again Tim Robbins last year, most likely would've won for Best Supporting Actor.  However I don't feel his character was a supporting role.  His character shared as much on-screen time at Penn and Watts, which was great.  I'm glad his character was focused on so much.  Amazing and powerful performance.

Even more powerful was Watts in her role as a grieving widow, who is going through something nobody would ever want to deal with, the loss of her husband and two daughters. Amazing job, and again, if she hadn't been up against Charlize Theron last year, she may have won Best Actress last year.

Amazing movie with an excellent script and the perfect actors.  A must see for everyone.

[BWilli]

I watched two DVDs over the holiday weekend.

The first was “Fatal Attraction” starring Michael Douglas, Glenn Close, and Anne Archer.

Douglas stars as Dan Gallagher, a New York lawyer, “happily” married to Beth (Archer), with a daughter.  One weekend when Beth goes away with the kid, Dan ends up having an affair with Alex Forrest (Close).  When his family returns though, Alex isn’t ready to let Dan go, and will do anything to keep him in her life, including non-stop phone calls, telling him she’s pregnant, boiling the family’s pet rabbit, and even “kidnapping” his kid for a day…freakin’ everyone out.

The film was up for 6 Academy Awards back in 1988, including Best Actress for Glenn Close.  Before I even found out that she was a nut case, just seeing her in her first scene in the film she looked scary as all hell. She is one ugly chick in this film.  However she plays a great psycho-bitch.  

Douglas was not nominated, but could have been.  He always seems to pick great roles, and this was one of them.

Anne Archer was nominated for Best Supporting Actress, and again, rightfully so.  She perfectly played the

The story was great, and Adrian Lyne’s directing was amazing.  He was up for Best Director at the Oscars.

I don’t promote cheating on your significant other, but if you ever think about it….WATCH THIS MOVIE FIRST.  It would definitely change your mind.   :razz:

…and if you’re not…watch the movie anyway…you can pick it up for $5.50 at WalMart.  

[BWilli]

The second DVD I saw was “The Terminal”.

The film stars Tom Hanks, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Stanley Tucci and is directed by Steven Spielberg.

Hanks is Victor Navorski, a man who arrives at JFK airport in NYC from his home country of Krakozhia (fictional country). While on the flight, war breaks out in his country, voiding his passport b/c the US cannot recognize Krakozhia as a country until the was is sorted out.  Because of this, Navorski is not allowed to enter the US, and must remain in the airport terminal.  However, Frank Dixon (Tucci), who is the Security Manager for international flight, doesn’t want to deal with the problem and continues to get Navorski to walk out of the terminal and onto the NYC streets, which would ultimately get him arrested and off Dixon’s hands…but Navorski is too smart for that…and he just hangs around and becomes an annoyance to Dixon.  While living in the terminal, Navorski befriends some of the employees, including Enrique Cruz (played by Diego Luna) who enlists Navorski to help him woo Officer Torres (played by Zoe Saldana).  Navorski also meets Amelia Warren (Zeta-Jones) a flight attendant who he develops feelings for.  She has her own relationship problem though, doing a married man and what-not.  This is the film in a nut shell, without ruining too much of the film.

I found the film enjoyable and liked it a lot.  It didn’t make a killing at the box office like some of Spielberg’s other films, but it was good.  The story was told well, with some great acting for the most part.

I thought Hanks was really good in his role.  He has taken mostly dramatic roles over the past few years, but this was a mix between dramatic and comedic.  I liked seeing him in a “funnier” role again.  

Zeta-Jones looked amazing in this film.  Very beautiful…however, I wasn’t blown away by her acting in the film.  It wasn’t terrible, but it could’ve been a lot better.

Stanley Tucci is one of those actors who is friggen great in every role he plays.  He’s an amazing actor and I hope he wins an Oscar some day.  He won’t be nominated for this film, which is understandable, but the guy is a great actor.  Another great performance in this film.  He started off cool, then turned into an asshole, but still…excellent.

The film is a good romantic comedy.  I was impressed how the film ended…different than what I was expecting.  

Spielberg is still the man in my book, no matter what the critics though of this film.  

[BWilli]

Watched “Shaun Of The Dead” last night.

The film stars mostly people I’ve never heard of, but will definitely be checking out some of their other films; Simon Pegg, Kate Ashfield, Nick Frost, Peter Serafinowicz and Bill Nighy (the only one I recognize because of Underworld and Love Actually).

Shaun (Pegg) is your below average thirty-something who it seems has no real goal in life; lacking any real ambition. He drives his long-suffering girlfriend Liz (Ashfield) around the bend. He seems to pay more attention to his fellow loser pals and housemates Ed (Frost) and Pete (Serafinowicz). Other than his basic faults, Shaun is otherwise a decent enough person. He soon realizes how much Liz means to him when with out warning, the undead begin to walk the earth (or to shorten it down, Crouch End in London). Now it's a race against time for Shaun to not only spring to the rescue of the girl he loves, but his dear sweet Mum as well.

From the moment I saw the first trailer I had heard great things about this film.  There were quotes from Peter Jackson, George Romero, and Stephen King, saying that this film is amazing funny and scary.  I wouldn’t say it was so much scary, but just really gory in a few scenes, especially when they rip that one dude apart and tare out his insides.  However the film gets an A+ for its comedy.  The scene in the bar, where Shaun, Liz and Ed are beatin’ on the zombie bartender to the beat of the Queen song was great.  

There were a few “dramatic”-type scenes thrown into the film.  The scene, also in the bar, with Shaun and his Mum reminded me of a scene in “From Dusk Till Dawn”…eh…then again…maybe it was supposed to…  :-P  

Simon Pegg was the key to the film’s comedy.  He’s hilarious throughout the film.  Nick Frost was the perfect goofy side-kick.  The scene where he’s trying to cheer up Shaun, also in the bar (yes…a lot of this film takes place in a bar), was great.

Again…I didn’t think the film was all that scary, and I may have even liked it more if it was, but I enjoyed it.  Had a lot of good laughs.  It’s well worth adding to your DVD collections, or at least renting it…

Once you’ve watched the DVD, check out “Funky Pete” in the extras section. This is funking funny sheet! The filmmakers take a scene from the film that made excessive use of the expletive ‘fuck’ and replace it with ‘funk’. And it’s even funnier than it funkin’ sounds.